Tag: life

This week has been very emotional for me, in some of the best ways possible.

Firstly, I was finally able to bury the hatchet and move on from some serious drama with a friend of mine, which has been great, because we are finally back to relative normal after six months of completely not talking to each other. It’s like it didn’t happen, which is what I wanted.

Also, this week was the last week of term before the Christmas holidays (yay) which meant that I got a lot of cards from a lot of friends. Most of them were the typical

To: XXX, Merry Christmas, From: XXX

They are cute and I love the sentiment, and it’s what I’m used to getting.

Except this year I got something different. My friends, who I’ve decided to call Dolphin and Penguin, gave me what were quite possibly the best cards I’ve ever recieved.

I opened them, instantly saw the essays they’d written inside, and by the end my eyes were almost brimming with tears, I was so happy.

I understand that some of you might be used to stuff like this all the time from your friends and so you probably won’t understand why this means so much to me, but it does.

You see, this time last year I was really very lonely. I spent endless nights wondering if I had any friends, if anyone liked me. Sometimes I went to the extreme of wondering, “Would anyone really care if I just disappeared?”

I felt so alone, and when I saw all those people who get beautiful thoughtful sentimental birthday presents and emotional hand-written cards from their best friends, I sat there and I thought, “That will never be me.”

I wanted that so badly. I yearned for friendships like that, but inside I thought that it wasn’t possible. Why would actual people choose to spend more time with me than they have to?

And now… Now I have some friends who I honestly never thought would be as amazing as they are.

If you’re reading this, Dolphin, Penguin, Tigress, Llama, you guys mean the world to me now. Even when you have stupid animal names, you’ve been there for me, and I promise I’ll be there for you for as long as you want me to be.

We’ve had so many amazing memories together, and if you told me last year that I would have all of you by my side, I probably wouldn’t have believed you.

It’s the little things, the things we laugh about, the things I can talk to you about without fear of judgement and everything else we have that adds up to me being happier than I’ve ever been.

Anyway, enough of me being an emotional. As you can probably tell, I’m just really happy.

My favourite animal is without a doubt a lion, they are simultaneously the most majestic and adorable of all creatures.

My two loves are writing and music, sadly these have to be pushed aside a lot of the time to make room for responsibilities.

A book I’ve been loving at the moment is “All the Bright Things” by Jennifer Niven, it’s such an incredible story. Go read it!

I really want to redecorate my room, and I have for literally forever.

I once accidentally called 999 and slammed the phone down while home alone. I then felt so bad that I rang them up again to apologise, which in hindsight may have not been the best idea because I’m still preventing someone with a real emergency from calling. Well done me.

I am constantly terrified about whether I have any close friends, even when I know I do. I don’t think I’ll ever stop worrying about it.

Okay, so now I have to answer these questions.

What is your favourite meal? In terms of comfort food, I would probably say my mum’s spaghetti bolognaise. That stuff is good.

What is the most played song/ your favourite song? Right now I’ve been obsessed with Troye Sivan’s new album but my all-time favourite song? I don’t actually know, I love music too much to just pick one 🙂

So I’ve come to a certain realisation about the way that I talk about people here on this blog. This is anonymous, and so when I’m talking about various friends etc. I’m sure that for you all these people have merged into one confusing person with many conflicting characteristics.

Therefore, I’m going to use code names for all my friends so they seem a little bit more like real people to you, and so you can distinguish between them when I talk about them.

I’ve decided to use animal names – and had wayy too much fun deciding on which animals I would use for which people – and so in future when I’m talking about people for now I will be consistent with the names I use 🙂

Love from,

XXX

P.S. I realise this is not the most exciting of posts which is why I posted it on the same night as my story 🙂

So this weekend I have been doing a lot of revision for mocks that are coming up. Please don’t ask me for anything in the way of revision tips because I’m pretty dreadful myself, so I doubt I’ll be helpful.

While revising and procrastinating as I inevitably do, I was thinking about what I actually want to do with my life and why I’m studying when I could be doing more enjoyable things.

And I’ve come to a realisation. There are so many things I want to do with the little time I have, and that’s probably going to continue for a good portion of my life, so I really need a balance of schoolwork but then all the creative projects outside school that I want to do. I thought I’d give you a few examples.

Writing: I love writing and I really want to devote more of my time to writing longer and more complex stories. Or just more short ones, but I really do love writing.

Music: I want to do something with my love of music and my musical abilities, and it is something I absolutely adore doing. So that’s definitely something I will be doing.

Blogging: This blog is definitely one of my loves, and actually I have something to say about blogging.

So this week I reached one hundred followers. That’s incredible and amazing and when I found out I wanted to laugh and cry and I was in a ridiculously good mood for the entire rest of the day.

I can’t even get my brain to wrap around the idea that one hundred people have bothered to take the time to care about what I have to say, some of them week after week. That’s so many people.

Words can’t express how happy this has made me, and I am so so so so incredibly grateful that all of you have stuck with me. Thank you.

Nine months ago, I started a blog, and I really didn’t think I’d keep it up for longer than a few weeks. And now, nine months and a hundred followers later, I’ve realised that this blog and this community makes me so happy, and I love sharing my life with you guys.
It makes my day when people leave lovely comments, and I never thought that I would make as many friends as I did.

So I’m making a promise. Of course I’ll keep up with schoolwork, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to neglect any of my other loves. I’m only going to get this once, and I might as well make the most of it and live, without just fufilling my duty in society.

I did have another quote and another post planned, but in light of recent events there was absolutely no way I could remain in the light-hearted superficial mood that I am normally in.

I would hope that most of you are aware of what happened on Friday, especially because I’m not going to go into the details. I’m just going to talk about how I feel, my honest opinions.

I’ve liked the posts on Facebook, I’ve changed my picture to have the colours of the French flag, but it really didn’t feel like enough. I had to speak about it in the best way I knew how: here, talking to you.

I was actually told by someone not to post this on here, and that did make me angry. What’s this blog for except sharing opinions, even if they are a bit “controversial”?

I actually can’t find the words right now. This has shook the world, because in so many countries- not just France, I do acknowledge that- there was cold and there was calculated murder. There was murder without rhyme or reason of innocent civilians, innocents. That’s what gets me. It wasn’t a plan to destroy a building of significance or usefulness. Murder for the sake of murder.

Those poor people had done absolutely nothing, except be terribly unfortunate to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. And now they’ve lost friends, loved ones, or they’re terribly injured and clinging to life in a generic ward in a French hospital.

Or worse, they’ve become a statistic. Tragedies like this are emphasised when people become statistics. It makes it seem less real when they’re just numbers, not people with families and lives. Apparently it makes it harder for people to empathise.

And some of the people in this country have the nerve to blame the refugees and the innocent Muslims. There is an awful lot of prejudice in this country and this world. Blaming the refugees, of all people. I saw a post on Facebook that said something along the lines of, “Don’t you realise that these are the people the refugees are running away from?” Couldn’t have said it better myself.

And the “All Muslims are terrorists” stereotype has to stop. I don’t understand how people can just generalise an entire group of people based on a handful of people who happen to share the same characteristic.

I am proud of the solidarity the world as a whole has shown against these people, but there is an undercurrent of prejudice and discrimination that can’t help to shed some light even in the darkest of times.

So this week I’ve been around a lot of horoscopes. Not sure why, but for some reason my mother has been discussing horoscopes with me, as have my friends.

I’m on the fence about horoscopes. The idea that just because you were born at a specific time of the year you immediately fit a set of pre-moulded characteristics is a little unrealistic, and I’m not really a fan.

Although I do like the idea of a celestial being in the sky that helps me make my life decisions.

I mean, it can be fun to look at horoscopes every once in a while and laugh about what they say about your personality or future goals, but people who obsess over horoscopes and over-analyse them to the point of worshipping them like a Bible are, in my opinion, putting all their faith down to something as inconsistent as whether Venus is in the third house or not. It’s not exactly set in stone.

I understand why people like horoscopes: when I read mine there are many things that make me go, “I’m completely like that! It knows!” But that’s probably because the people who have written the horoscopes have included something that everyone can relate to. It’s not a set of rules.

Although I don’t believe in horoscopes, I do believe in luck. Ironic, huh? Whenever something happens that I think is out of my control, I think, “Damn, that was bad luck.” Or “That was amazing I have such good luck!”

I guess that does make me a bit hypocritical. But we humans do like to find ways to comprehend the world in, and ways to understand and, in a way, control the uncontrollable are always useful.

Luck is mine. Other people use horoscopes, or karma, or even religion, and that’s good too.

Love from,

XXX

P.S. This isn’t the most perfect post in the world, but I did write it on a train, so hopefully you can excuse me.

So for the past month or so – this post is a little bit later than I was planning it to be, but better late than never – I’ve been seeing everyone who is a part of the Teens Tell Their Story project writing letters to their future and past selves, and even though I was never a part of this project, I thought, Hey! That looks like a fun idea. I could make a post out of that.

Funny story: When I was around 13 I came across a website called www.futureme.org and thought, Hey! That looks like a fun idea. I could write a letter to myself. So I properly went and wrote an essay to myself, probably full of emotion and all that, and then I scheduled it to be delivered to myself by email two years from that date.

So, the date that I scheduled it to be delivered on was about two weeks ago, and it didn’t turn up, which made me very sad. That letter is now lost forever, so who knows what I said. 13 year old me was a weird time.

Funnily enough, on that same night I accidentally called 999, but that’s another story.

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I realise that I’ve been rambling on for 200 words and I haven’t started writing a letter yet. Well done me. Okay, let’s go!

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Dear Me,

I don’t know what year it is when you’re reading this, but I’m assuming that it’s quite far away from now, 2015. Even 2015 is about to become the past, it’s November 1st and there are only two months left until the new year, which is both exciting and absolutely terrifying. I’m definitely not ready for 2016.

Just to set the scene, at the moment I’m listening to Right Here, Right Now from High School Musical 3, which has put me in a weird nostalgic mood. Can you remember the last time you watched High School Musical? If not, eleven-year old you is probably crying in a corner. Go and watch it right now! Hopefully you still remember all the words. I just discovered that I still do.

I hope you’re having a nice life. I’m assuming that you’ve finished university – oh God, I can’t even think about uni right now, I’m so undecided on my A-levels I don’t know how I’m going to make that decision – and you chose a course that you’re happy with and you feel comfortable in, not one chosen for or by our parents or anyone else.

There are two ideal versions of what job I want you to be doing:

1. Something that pays decently enough that you can enjoy life, but also a job that you enjoy doing.

2. You’re rich and famous because of something you love, like writing or singing and you can really enjoy life but make a difference to other people’s lives. Not gonna lie, I’m hoping for the second one.

Even if you aren’t rich and famous, I want you to be in a great career that doesn’t stress you out too much and that you enjoy. If not, remember it’s never too late to change.

I hosp you’re keeping in touch with all of your school friends. If not, go ring them right now. All of them. I’m ashamed of you for not keeping up your friendships. We have some incredible memories together, and I’m sure we’ll create some epic ones in years to come.

Right now, I’ll tell you a few of the things I’m worried about. My mocks are rapidly approaching, I’m worried that I don’t have any deep meaningful friendships, I’m terrified that people are judging me and getting the wrong impression of me, it’s going to be 2016 and then I have to pick my A-levels and then it’s my GCSEs and then after that, the thought of prom and leaving school is lurking in the back of my brain.

I hope that now these things seem silly and insignificant. I really do. I’m sure you’re worrying about much more important things. I’m really looking forward to it.

Hopefully you can still understand sarcasm.

I’m wondering how you’re going to come across this letter. I hope that one day you just remember the little blog you had as a teenager and rush to find it and go through all the posts. Then you really can remember what it was like to be a teenager, what it was like to be me, because you’ll have a week-by-week account.

I guess the main reason why I’m writing you this letter is because I don’t want you to forget. I don’t want you to forget little teenage you who wants to be a writer and a singer and a Youtuber and has all these amazing crazy dreams and plans for the future before they’ve been crushed by the harsh realities of the real world.

I want you to remember that at one point the next Disney movie to come out was the most exciting thing ever, and your favourite colour was red and you loved lions and you wrote stories and songs and had pink fairy lights up in your room and listened to music and contemplated life.

Right now I want do something meaningful with my life, and more importantly, something that means something to other people.

I don’t want you to forget this part of you, aka me, because if you let me down, you know you’re letting yourself down. You’re not giving up on our dreams, because I’m not letting you.

I could probably ramble on forever and I’m nearly in tears, but I’m going to stop now, so I guess my final words are be happy, never doubt yourself and your abilities, don’t regret anything, do all the things you love and then life will be great.

Don’t give up, okay. I believe in you.

Lots of love,

15-year old you

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Love from,

XXX

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Hello!

Welcome to my little blog, I hope you like it!
Take the time to stay and look around, and get a glimpse into my world.
I am a creative writer, which normally leads to me thinking too much, and I normally blog about whatever life throws at me.
All of my posts are in letter form to my friend Emma, who moved away when I started my blog.